benign influence
of the food and the woman's cheery personality, the spirits of the crowd
rose. Baldpate Inn was in the past, its doors locked, its seven keys
scattered through the dawn. Mrs. Quimby, as she continued to press food
upon them, spoke with interest of the events that had come to pass at
the inn.

"It's so seldom anything really happens around here," she said, "I just
been hungering for news of the strange goings-on up there. And I must
say Quimby ain't been none too newsy on the subject. I threatened to
come up and join in the proceedings myself, especially when I heard
about the book-writing cook Providence had sent you."

"You would have found us on the porch with outstretched arms," Mr. Magee
assured her.

It was on Kendrick that Mrs. Quimby showered her attentions, and when
the group rose to seek the station, amid a consultation of watches that
recalled the commuter who rises at dawn to play tag with a flippant
train, Mr. Magee heard her say to the railroad man in a heartfelt aside:

"I don't know as I can ever thank you enough, Mr. Kendrick, for putting
new hope into Quimby. You'll never understand what it means, when you've
given up, and your life seems all done and wasted, to hear that there's
a chance left."

"Won't I?" replied Kendrick warmly. "Mrs. Quimby, it will make me a very
happy man to give your husband his chance."

The first streaks of dawn were in the sky when the hermits of Baldpate
filed through the gate into the road, waving good-by to Quimby and his
wife, who stood in their dooryard for the farewell. Down through sleepy
little Asquewan Falls they paraded, meeting here and there a tired man
with a lunch basket in his hand, who stepped to one side and frankly
stared while the odd procession passed.

In the station Mr. Magee encountered an old friend--he of the mop of
ginger-colored hair. The man who had complained of the slowness of the
village gazed with wide eyes at Magee.

"I figured," he said, "that you'd come this way again. Well, I must say
you've put a little life into this place. If I'd known when I saw you
here the other night all the exciting things you had up your sleeve, I'd
a-gone right up to Baldpate with you."

"But I hadn't anything up my sleeve," protested Magee.

"Maybe," replied the agent, winking. "There's some pretty giddy stories
going round about the carryings-on up at Baldpate. Shots fired, and
strange lights flashing--dog-gone it, the only thing that